After the restoration
of the monarchy in 1660, and the new Prayer Book in 1662, there arose
two schools of thought, or parties, in the Anglican Church, regarding
what to do with those who would not conform to the Church of England.
One, that of Comprehension, sought to make accommodations in the Church
so that non-Anglicans (Nonconformists, or Dissenters) could comprehend,
or accept and be reconciled with the Anglican Church. The other, that
of Toleration, sought to simply allow the Dissenters to practice their
own beliefs without interference. (Of course, there were also a large
number who did not share either of these views). The idea of toleration
was quite new at that time, it being commonly accepted for centuries that
the peace and stability of the kingdom required that everyone have a common
religion.

all
was digested into one entire correction of every thing that seemed
liable to any just objection. But this great and good work miscarried
at that time-from
the Preface to the Proposed (1786) U. S. Book of Common Prayer

The
kings immediately following the Restoration, Charles II and James II,
either had Catholic leanings (Charles), or openly gave allegiance to the
Roman Catholic Church (James). Therefore, while they ruled, the idea of
toleration was impractical as it would have had to include Catholics,
and neither the Church of England nor the Nonconforming Protestants wanted
that. So the idea of comprehension gained strength, and several clerics
in the Church of England proposed that revisions be made to the Book of
Common Prayer acceptable to the Protestant Nonconformists, or at least
a significant number of them. Accordingly in 1688 a committee was set
up to revise the Prayer Book, which led to a Convocation of the Church
in 1689 and the appointing of a formal Commission for that revision. Prominent
among the Commission members, and to whom this book may be largely attributed,
were Bishop William Lloyd, and Deans Edward Stillingfleet, Symon Patrick,
and John Tillotson (pictured at right). However, by the time the Commission
had finished, the Glorious Revolution had taken place, overthrowing King
James and bringing the firmly Protestant King William and Queen Mary to
the throne. This gave new strength to the Nonconformists, who, more so
now, desired no part of the Church of England, and just wanted toleration.
And now toleration could safely exclude Catholics. So this revision was
never submitted to Convocation, much less to Parliament, and was simply
dropped. In fact, it was dropped so thoroughly that the very existence
of any text of the revision was only a rumor until Parliament finally
ordered it printed in 1854 - meaning the details of the revision were
unknown to all but the participants until then. (The resulting 1854 text
is online thanks to the
Internet Archive and Google
Books, and appears in David Grifftihs' Bibliography of the Book
of Common Prayer as 1854/1).

As one might expect,
this revision of the Prayer Book moved the liturgy in a decidedly Protestant
direction. There were no wholesale changes, but quite a few significant
ones. Some of the changes included:

'Priest' was
changed to 'Minister' wherever in appears , and 'Sunday' to 'Lord's
Day'.

All lessons from
the Apocrypha were eliminated

Clergy were allowed
to not wear the surplice, if their conscience would not permit it.

The Doxology ("For
thine is the kingdom...") is added to the Lord's Prayer wherever
it appears.

Psalm 148 was
substituted for the Benedicite in Morning Prayer; and in Evening
Prayer, Psalm 8 was added and Psalm 134 substituted for the Nunc
dimittis.

A number of elements
were added to the Litany, having the effect of making more of a service
on its own, and bringing it in line with the common usage of the day.

The collects were
almost completely rewritten, with the new ones generally being considerably
longer than the old, and typically featuring phrases from the associated
scripture.

In the Communion
service, it was permitted to substitute the Beatitudes for the Ten Commandments,
and a number of the former collects were added at the end. An addition
to the "Black Rubric" permitted receiving communion without
kneeling.

Parents were allowed
to be sponsors in Baptism, and the minister was not forced to make the
sign of the cross, if his conscience would not permit it.

A number of responses
were added to the Catechism, and a long exhortation to the Confirmation
service.

In Matrimony,
the ring is "used only as a civil ceremony and pledge", and
some of the more earthy language altered.

The Commination
was renamed "A Proper Office for Ash-Wednesday", and lengthened
considerably.

The Ordinal addressed
the sticky question of what to do about Nonconformist clergy who had
not been ordained by Church of England Bishops. It was proposed that
such current clergy be 'grandfathered' and not be reordained. A number
of other changes were also made in response to the issue of Nonconformist
clergy.

John Tillotson,
one of the authors of the revision.

Title page from
a contemporary (1666) Book of Common Prayer

The
main source used here was a copy of the 1689 book published by Samuel
Bagster in 1855 (Griffiths 1855/29) shortly after Parliament ordered the
text released. This book is interleaved with the (then-current) 1662 BCP,
and for the 1689 text it prints only the differences from 1662. This book
is also available from
Google Books. The book The Liturgy of Comprehension 1689, by
Timothy J. Fawcett (Alcuin Club, 1973; Griffiths 1973/1), was also consulted
extensively. The 1662 text used (for where the 1689 did not differ from
the 1662) came from text files from the Reformed Episcopal Church, and
from a contemporary copy (illustrated above) printed in 1666.

This Book was never
a completely finished product (and, as noted above, only a single copy
survived), so there are areas where the intent of the authors is not completely
clear, and others where a final decision was to be left up to Convocation.
These are indicated in the text. Notes in the original text are in black
type; my own or those from the Bagster reprint are in grey.

To the best of my
knowledge, this is the first time this book has been printed out in full,
including those portions where it did not differ from the 1662 BCP.

Finally, it should
also be noted that the opinion expressed in the initial quote above is
by no means universal.